Architecture as a Macro-Cognitive Artifact: A Material Engagement Theory Analysis of Moriyama House
Theoretical Framework: Architecture Beyond Representation
Material Engagement Theory (MET) challenges traditional views that treat architecture as either a neutral container or a symbolic system. Instead, it proposes that cognition emerges through dynamic interactions between humans and material environments. Within this framework, buildings actively participate in shaping perception, behavior, and meaning. Architecture is thus understood as a cognitive extension, where thinking unfolds through engagement with spatial and material conditions rather than being confined to the human mind alone.
Thinging and Enactive Signification in Spatial Experience
The study explores the concept of “thinging,” or thinking through materials, where cognition is distributed across interactions with physical elements. In Moriyama House, spatial fragmentation encourages inhabitants to engage directly with discrete volumes, pathways, and thresholds. Enactive signification further explains how meanings such as privacy, openness, and social interaction are not predefined but emerge through embodied practices. These meanings are continuously performed through movement, occupation, and sensory engagement with the architectural environment.
Participatory Agency and We-Intentionality in Architecture
Architecture is examined as a site of participatory agency, where human and non-human elements jointly shape actions and decisions. In this context, walls, voids, and spatial separations are not passive features but active contributors to behavioral outcomes. The study also highlights the role of we-intentionality, where shared goals and social interactions are materialized through collective engagement with space. In Moriyama House, the dispersed layout fosters unique forms of communal living, where social relationships are negotiated through spatial configurations.
Metaplasticity and the Evolution of Cognitive Habits
The concept of metaplasticity captures the long-term, reciprocal transformation between inhabitants and architectural space. Over time, repeated interactions with the built environment reshape user behaviors, habits, and perceptions, while the architecture itself undergoes physical and experiential changes. This ongoing feedback loop illustrates how architecture and cognition co-evolve, reinforcing the idea that buildings are dynamic participants in cognitive life rather than static objects.
Methodological Approach and Cognitive Habitat Formation
The research employs a hybrid methodology combining architectural analysis with frame-by-frame deconstruction of the ethnographic film Moriyama-San. This approach enables detailed observation of everyday interactions between inhabitants and space, revealing how cognitive processes are embedded in lived experience. The findings demonstrate that the five MET processes collectively form a “cognitive habitat,” where architecture actively structures and sustains patterns of thought, behavior, and social interaction.
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